‘Inhumane’: Top Belgium officials criticise Israeli bombing of Gaza

Belgian politicians and officials are increasingly questioning the scale and legality of Israel’s offensive in Gaza, as more civilians are killed and a humanitarian disaster unfolds in the densely populated enclave.

On Monday, at a conference in Brussels, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, a liberal democrat, described Israel’s campaign in Gaza as “disproportionate”.

“If you bomb an entire refugee camp with the intention of eliminating a terrorist, I don’t think it’s proportionate,” he said, but insisted that “Belgium will not take sides”.

On Wednesday, Belgium’s deputy prime minister made a rare European call for sanctions against Israel.

“It’s time,” Petra De Sutter, a Green party politician, told the Flemish newspaper Het Nieuwsblad. “The rain of bombs is inhumane.”

De Sutter has also urged Hamas to release hostages and said money flows to “this terrorist organisation” must be stopped immediately.

A day later, Caroline Gennez, Belgium’s minister of development cooperation, suggested that the government was considering recognising the state of Palestine.

And Fourat Ben Chikha, vice president of the Senate of Belgium – the federal parliament’s upper house – told Al Jazeera on Friday that “You don’t need to be a human rights professor or international lawyer to understand that international law is no longer being respected in this war.”

He said progressive parties like the Greens, to which he belongs, have begun raising their voices in support of Palestine to build political pressure.

“There is no longer any rational reason for the death and violence we are seeing in Gaza. Even for the Israelis whose relatives have been taken as hostages, the bombing of Gaza isn’t helping,” he said.

These statements appear in contrast with most leaders in Europe, where few have directly criticised Israel’s bombing campaign that began on October 7, in response to Hamas’s unprecedented attacks.

The general European view is that Israel has a right to self-defence, given the horrors of the Hamas incursion, as long as it stays within the boundaries of international law.

The Hamas assault killed more than 1,400 Israelis, and saw more than 240 kidnapped. Israel’s attacks, officially aimed at wiping out the Palestinian group that rules Gaza, have killed more than 11,000 people in 34 days, including more than 4,500 children.

After De Sutter called for sanctions against Israel, German politician Reinhard Bütikofer wrote on X: “That is not the position of the European Greens.”

“The German Greens in particular totally oppose such a move that would blame Israel for the crimes of Hamas who are using civilians as human shields.”

But the shifting tone is being welcomed by some.

Abdalrahim al-Farra, Palestine’s ambassador to the EU, Belgium and Luxembourg, said he has witnessed “a clear change in the position of the Belgian government”.